The contradictions of recent Saudi policies have become quite complicated and may soon prove overwhelming!

In Syria the Saudis have been arming and financing Islamic rebels to take down the Assad Shia Alawite Bathist regime in Damascus; and as a result elements from the same forces are now threatening to take down the American/Iranian sponsored regime in Baghdad and today declared an Islamic Caliphate!

In Cairo the Saudis are the main backers of the Egyptian Military Junta, yet one of their greatest fears has always been a possible military coup against the Royal Family.

And the Saudis and Egyptians are now supporting an anti-Qatar Cairo-based opposition group aiming to bring down the Qatari royals, even though the Saudis would be aghast if Egypt or anyone else allowed a Saudi opposition group to operate in public.

In Israel the Saudis were pushed hard by the Americans to champion a Saudi and Arab League peace plan, only to be abandoned and discredited by Washington which is itself totally dominated by the Israeli/Jewish Lobby. Even so, under the table, the Saudis and Israelis have been flirting together for some time, though at the same time the worse-than-apartheid situation for the Palestinians has been escalated.

And now the Saudi King has for the first time appointed a new and controversial Deputy Crown Prince, something that has never happened before, as an end to the direct descendants of the Kingdom’s founder approaches. The new appointee has little popular or even family support at home, but is known to be close to the Americans, and this move comes just weeks after President Obama’s most recent visit to The Kingdom.